


Truth Unspoken

by LovelyJasmari



Series: Kalai Daughter of the Wind ~ One Shots [1]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Angst, Forbidden Love, Hollow Bastion | Radiant Garden, Other, This Is Sad, Tragic Romance, like very sad, technically acts as a prequel to most of my already published works
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:13:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23387923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LovelyJasmari/pseuds/LovelyJasmari
Summary: Dilan spends one final night with the one woman he has ever truly loved, and their newborn child.
Series: Kalai Daughter of the Wind ~ One Shots [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1872646
Kudos: 2





	Truth Unspoken

**Author's Note:**

> So this was initially written as part of an angst prompt challenge in my oc group some months ago. It was unfinished for a while because I found a better theme for the prompt and I couldn't find the inspiration to finish this. However, after reading Dilan's translated character file, where he talks about love being a curse, I found new inspration so here it is.
> 
> Now technically this serves as a prequel to Days in the Sun and occurs within the timeline of chapter 1 (before the decade time skip). I've written various snippets of Dilan interacting with Ilise but this is the only full ficlet I've ever written with them.

~~~

Midnight darkness shrouded everything, save for the little lamp in her room. The door was slightly ajar so the light would stretch to the hallway, guiding him to her. Though certain that all in the castle were asleep except for them, Ilise would not dare risk going to him, and leave her child alone for too long. She was asleep as well, but babies were unpredictable things and the mother knew she might wake at any moment. 

Footsteps, at first she thought it her imagination before she subtly could hear them becoming louder. He was close, she could feel it in the pounding of her heart against her chest. Her fingers intertwined and pressed against her chest in a futile attempt to quell her agony. 

It had not yet been said aloud, and it could never be said for that matter. But one just had to take a single glance at her daughter to understand the terrible truth. Her husband had admonished her fiercely for it when she was born. As if the soft raven hair and round amethyst eyes were her fault entirely. He didn't have to say a thing though, Ilise was well aware of the grim fate that awaited her child, destined to forever exist as proof of the greatest indiscretion of her life. 

The door slowly creaked open and Dilan walked in, his eyes immediately shifting towards the infant sleeping on the bed beside her mother. He wasted no words. 

“Was this the reason you were sent away so abruptly last year?” he asked. “Is this why you finally agreed to marry him? After you told me so many times that you would never marry if…”

“I’m sorry,” she interrupted. “I wanted to tell you, I must have started a thousand letters. I even tried to get back to the capital before the wedding. But he stopped me, told me I had to marry him. And that he would go to my uncle and have you arrested if I tried to have contact with you again.”

“Then why?” Dilan took her hands into his, firmly squeezing them but gently enough to rouse a familiar warmth in Ilise’s heart. “Why did you request I come to you tonight? Surely you know the risk we’re taking.”

“Because!”

It was at this moment that the infant began to stir. Ilise immediately went to her and gently lifted her up, stroking her soft head of hair and trying to keep her from making any noise. When she was sure that her child was still sleeping, she glanced at Dilan with a little smile.

“My husband promised he’d accept her.” she sighed. “For all intents and purposes, Kalai is the firstborn child of Lord and Lady Rowan. And I was willing to accept the lie, continue telling it for the duration of her life, but…” Her sorrowful blue gaze locked with his. “Seeing you two in the garden today, seeing how well she responds to you, you know she wails and wails whenever my husband gets close to her. But with you...today I understood how wrong it would be to keep this from you. One of you had to know the truth. Even if she never does.”

“I _already_ knew the truth, Ilise,” he replied, meeting her reluctant smirk with one of his own. “I knew the truth the second I set my eyes upon her. It’s a wonder His Lordship did not raise any questions.”

“And hopefully, he never will.” Ilise sat back on the bed, her child still in her arms. Her eyes were beginning to open but thankfully, she was making little noise. Dilan sat beside her, his eyes returning to the child. Despite the heavy aching in her chest, a little chuckle escaped her. 

“If you could have seen his face when she was born,” she said. “ ‘She looks nothing like you! Her eyes aren’t even blue! Anyone with a brain can see your indiscretion in her face!’"

The way she mimicked her husband made Dilan chuckle as well, so accurate to his grandiose character. And he rolled his eyes thinking how he could berate Ilise for something that wasn't her fault. Fault was hardly a word he would use in this situation anyway, Kalai was a treasure, beautiful because her mother was beautiful. 

"Well, I didn’t ask for her not to look like me!" Ilise went on, her voice shaking. "But he wouldn’t listen. He never listens. He…” 

Tears melted in her eyes at the bitter recollection and almost on instinct, Kalai began to softly whimper, almost in response to the sadness in her mother. A little doll in the form of a bunny lay on the pillow beside them and Ilise picked it up, giving it to her daughter. But no comfort she could give would stop the coming tears. Dilan watched this with a heaviness in his heart that threatened to bring tears to his eyes as well. 

“I’m sorry,” he sighed. “You don’t deserve this. Both of you deserve better. I’m sorry I couldn’t give that to you, Ilise.”

“And I’m sorry,” she replied with a sniff. “I’m sorry that she’ll never know who you are, Dilan.”

“Yes, I’m sorry for that too.” 

From the moment she arrived at the castle a few days ago, holding their child in her arms, he had hoped for a moment like this to happen. This was the closest they would ever come to being the family they had dreamed of being. In truth their love was doomed from the start, there was a sea of difference in their status and Dilan was aware that her family always wanted better for her than a mere guardsman who was on bad terms with his own family anyway. Knowing this, from the moment they met, from the moment he could sense his love for her beginning to grow, he had done everything in his power to guard his heart against Ilise. He never wanted to love her for this very reason. 

But hearts were unpredictable things, not so unlike babies. And even after all that had transpired between them, even if they were destined to never be happy together, Dilan still loved Ilise, loved her more than ever. And in the sweet little face of their daughter, he saw a symbol of that love and all that was beautiful in it. He had been holding back a strong urge to reach out to mother and child and now found the task impossible to continue. Before the child’s crying could increase, he gently pulled her away from her mother’s arms, pressing her against his broad chest and finding that Ilise did not object.

“Shhh, hush now, Little One.” he softly coaked the child, patting her head. “Don’t cry, Little One. It’s alright.”

Dilan continued holding her, gently rocking her back and forth until her crying faded and she nuzzled against him. Ilise gazed at them with tears still filling her eyes. Kalai was scarcely a year old but her husband already made it clear that he hated her and always would. She would be raised under that cloud of hatred and Dilan had shown himself to be far better with the child than her husband would ever be. When he was certain she was calm, he took another glance at her tiny face and allowed himself the smallest of smiles.

”Do you love him?”

“What?!”

“You heard me.” he took his eyes off of Kalai momentarily to gaze at Ilise. “Do you love him?”

“No! I don’t!” she replied, sounding slightly offended. “How could you even ask me that?! You know I don’t. I could never love any other man.” A soft red tint covered her face.”Not after what we’ve shared. I married him because I had no choice, to keep him from coming after you.”

“Hmph.” He gazed at his daughter again, gazing into his own eyes in her own. A little smile had bloomed on Kalai’s face that made his own grow wider. “Well then, I consider this my revenge.”

“Revenge?” 

“He may have married you, but he must forever look upon the face of the one you truly love. His rival in the eyes of this little one.”

“I don’t think that’s exactly a good thing,” she replied, trying to smile as well. “He certainly doesn’t think so, and it would be just our luck if she grows up with a fascination for lances and warfare, like her father.” 

“It is possible,” Dilan chuckled. “It’s also possible she will grow into a proper young lady with a love for flowers and music, like her mother.”

“And it’s possible she may be a mixture of both!” 

Together they shared a few precious moments of laughter, just as they often did in the days when their thoughts were filled with only each other. When all they could think of was how much they loved one another and of the perfect future they imagined themselves living that in the end turned out only to be a fantasy. But the fantasy had to end and the cruelty of their reality had to return. Kalai had returned to sleep and Dilan handed her back to Ilise, she sighed.

“Do you think she resembles me at all?”

Dilan hesitated, gazing thoughtfully at mother and child as he considered his answer. The truth was that at first glance, no, Kalai didn’t resemble Ilise in the slightest. Her dark hair and violet eyes were all his and he honestly felt she would grow up to resemble his own mother rather than her. And yet, there were a few similarities, the way the child's eyes sparkled when she giggled, or the wide-eyed look she gave him before reaching out for him, so like the looks her mother would give him. These similarities were admittedly subtle ones, so subtle that he felt only he could see them. But that was what made them so special. 

“Yes, I think so, as I said when we were in the garden earlier. She is lovely and charming. All that you are, my beloved. I can see that,” he closed his eyes, clenching his fists as he felt his tears coming. “I can see that because I love you more than he ever will.”

“I know…” she could no longer bear the looks his deep violet eyes gave her and she turned her back to him, turning her attention away from the fantasy. “I never meant to fall in love with you.”

“Neither did I.” he reached out to touch her shoulder, but then thought better of it and decided it was high time he finally left before they were discovered. With a long and despondent sigh, Dilan rose to his feet. “And now, all I can hope for is that you will be happy, Ilise. And I hope our child will be happy as well.”

“I don’t know if happiness is truly an option for me anymore,” she replied, sliding her finger in the little grasp of her child. “My happiness is gone forever.” 

These were the last words she spoke and he did not coax her to say anything more, there was little they could say to each other that had not been said a thousand times over. Dilan took one last thoughtful look at his daughter, kissed her forehead, and promised that he would love her always even if she never knew. 

The second the door was shut and he was finally gone, the agony that had been long plaguing Ilise’s heart finally burst and she collapsed onto the floor and wept as she had never wept before. At that moment, the entire world seemed like a bleak abyss with the only light being her child. A child doomed to live under a cloud of hatred, who would be reminded of her lack of worth every day of her life. A child that was the product of a real and true love. All of this was of little consolation to her. 

And as she continued to cry at all that was lost, somewhere in another part of the castle, there was another who was crying as well. Crying all the tears he had been stubbornly holding back for far too long. Lamenting the cruelty of fate, the curse that was forbidden love, and the bleak abyss that he was also sentenced to. The only difference was that he had nothing to brighten his world.

_“My happiness is gone forever.”_

~~~

**Author's Note:**

> Poor Dilan, it's obvious he's gotten his heart broken and he really deserves to know love. Actually, ALL the apprentices do. Except Xehanort, he can eat it.
> 
> These character files have really given me new inspiration to write outside my oc universe. The other character files that really stuck out to me the most were (of course!) Marluxia and Larxene's! So much so that I'm currently working on an Elrena-centric multi chapter fic set in the Daybreak Town era. I've already finished the first two chapters but unfortunately it won't be ready to be posted here until sometime in the summer since I'm waiting to see if she will make anymore appearances in the final story updates before deciding on an ending. 
> 
> In the meantime, you can read snippets of this upcoming fic (titled Illumine mon Ciel) on my tumblr and Future Masters will be updated soon.


End file.
